On one Thursday I found myself on a plane to the Golden Drum Festival in Portorož, Slovenia.
Razorfish was invited to talk at the 22nd Festival with the theme “Transformation”. The topic is very close to the theme and message Razorfish has been talking in this year and the topic of the talk I was going to give was aptly named “Toolkit For Transformation”. The Festival is held in the beautiful Slovenian coast and the scenery was very nice at the hotel when I arrived.
Friday morning started the program with Jason Romeyko’s talk Curators In The Age Of Now. The talk focused on the modern age and it’s challenges and how to be a Creative Director in this age. He pointed out that creative direction was more like the curator at a museum, a person who has the guts and vision to pick from a vast pool of creative output the ones that make a statement and add to the overall story that the museum wants to tell with it’s exhibitions. I found this parallel very good.
He also set an example that to create good work you need to invest yourself and do good. He himself was pushing for Vangardist Magazine’s HIV+ awareness edition printed with HIV positive donated blood and he believed in the idea so much that he signed a paper that he’d lose he’s job at Saatchi & Saatchi if the campaign would crash and burn. Of course it didn’t. The project was one of the Grand Prix winners this year.
Another great talk was Harjot Singh bringing us to the basics of good marketing. Through common sense he outlined the military past of the Madison Avenue era of advertising and leading us to the age of Meaningful Marketing. A very fun and real talk.
My talk went smoothly and was a great to talk about the shifts in the industry to come and how as creatives we can prepare for the shifts.
The day ended with a massive award ceremony where the majority of the winners had a real social aspect and a wish to help out the ones the campaign involved. From Turkey the Vodafone Red Light Application 2.0 would help women that suffered domestic violence and from Serbia “Button for Help” tried to take on the issue of human trafficking with a button that helps the victims to send her data to border police and Interpol. The jury did take stand for socially good campaigns this year and it’s refreshing to see that advertising can have a positive impact on people’s lives while being successful campaigns to the companies that created them.
After the ceremony the final party went on with local electronic musicians showcasing the best beats.